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RECAP
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BOX SCORE
WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. (AP) -- A hectic few weeks may have caught up with Duke in the NCAA tournament Friday night.
The No. 1 Blue Devils started sluggish against 16th-seeded Lamar, but picked it up over the final 20 minutes for an 82-55 victory in the first round of the East Regional.
|  | | Duke's Jason Williams dished off seven assists to go with his 18 points. |
"We won the regular season, we won the (ACC) tournament and we finished No. 1 in the final poll," said Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski. "All those things happened, but you've got to get on to the next thing and that's difficult.
"You want to hear about (your accomplishments), that's human nature," he added. "But the tournament is not about human nature. It's about getting ready and playing hard -- all those things and not living in the past."
Jason Williams led the way with 18 points and seven assists, while Carlos Boozer added 16 points. The 6-foot-9 Boozer made five straight baskets in the second half as he had his way inside and Duke pulled away.
Top-seeded Duke (28-4), last year's NCAA runner-up, will now play No. 8 seed Kansas, an 81-77 overtime winner over DePaul, on Sunday.
Lamar (15-16) was making its first NCAA trip in 17 years, but the 32-point underdog refused to back down from the high-powered Blue Devils, whose 66 NCAA tourney wins rank fourth all-time.
Lamar stayed in the game by making 11 of 21 3-pointers, but shot 28 percent in the second half to fade late.
"We came into the game in complete awe of Duke and then realized early in the game they're just players," said Lamar coach Mike Deane. "Now, naturally we're all rooting for Duke to win the whole thing so we can tell everybody if we only got by Duke we could have won it ourselves."
The Cardinals pulled within two points 14 minutes into the game as Kenyon Spears had 14 of his 19 on four 3-pointers as the Duke fans, who had to drive only about an hour from the Durham campus, grew restless.
"It was an un-Duke-like performance, but a lot of that was Lamar," said Shane Battier. "They made us not look very good tonight."
It became clear this wasn't going to be as easy as Duke's two previous first-round games -- a 41-point victory over Florida A&M last year and a 36-point win over Radford in 1998.
Duke was greeted with the chant of "over-rated" from the Lamar fans as it entered the court for second-half warmups.
But Williams sank a 3-pointer, made a driving layup and sank a shot in the lane as Duke opened its 11-point halftime lead to 65-45 midway into the second period. At one point, the Blue Devils scored eight straight baskets in the paint.
"I'm just glad we came out and weren't intimidated," said Lamar's Landon Rowe. "We're happy now because we played hard and we left it out there on the court."
The Cardinals, who had lost eight of 10 prior to winning the Southland Conference tourney by a combined 14 points, survived a six-minute scoreless drought in the opening half to hang close.
Deane called three timeouts early to break up any momentum the Blue Devils could muster.
Duke led 34-31 with four minutes left before the break, closing the half with a 10-2 run as Nate James made a pair of 3-pointers.
Krzyzewski's rotation was cut short with the absence of reserve big man Matt Christensen, who sustained a head injury in practice earlier in the week and wasn't even on the bench.
The victory moved Krzyzewski within three of his 500th at Duke.
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ALSO SEE
Mens College Basketball Scoreboard
Lamar NCAA Team Report
Duke NCAA Team Report
Chat: NCAA Tourney
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